Dear leaders, over the past year I have ramped up my coaching, it is something I get a lot of energy from and I personally love seeing others develop their soft and hard skills.
With all of my coaching clients (from experienced middle managers to startup CEOs), the same themes manifest, they typically mention how others are perceived and how other people within their organisation seem to have an extra level of influence or power.
(And yes, even CEOs will raise this when they are relaxed)
An exercise I ask my clients to run through is breaking down these perceived power players and understanding their behaviours and is it common within their business.
Who, What, Why, How Exercise
Who – Who they are? Who are they connected to? Who do they champion?
What – What makes them “them”? What drives them? What behaviours do they have personally and in small groups? What makes them tick?
Why – Why are they in the position they are in? Why are they respected? Why do you think they are operating at that level above?
How – How did they get there? How do they act in front of people? How do they act in important meetings? How prepared are they? How do they act away from groups of people?
A hint, ‘the power player‘ is a blend of IQ, EQ and PQ, PQ aka political intelligence is always a core factor. Be aware that playing the game and knowing when to step out of the game is an essential skill many just do not work on and rarely decide to improve. Almost every skill a power player has is developed and nurtured for the environment they operate in now.
Two themes that usually stand out:
(1) Do they seem to rewrite the rules whenever they want?
(2) Or act in a way that others would be called out for?
Very often these colleagues are Internal influencers +, they have more influence than just title and status, they have an aura, they have strong beliefs or are the hammer (they force things through and ensure those around them deliver) or the strategic member of the senior leadership team and drives the business vision.
Next time you are wondering how certain people operate like power players, run through the who, what, why and how questions above.
Thanks and have a good week,
Danny Denhard
PS. Would someone benefit from this exercise or the breakdown of power players? Copy and paste https://focus.business/blog/leaders-letter-120 into teams or slack.